TEDxNewHaven - Nima Tshering - A Story of Gross National Happiness by TEDx Talks 6 years ago

Nima Tshering is an engineer by training, a public servant by profession, and a "servant leader" by passion.Before coming to Harvard, he worked as an assistant to the King of Bhutan at the Office for People's Welfare and Wellbeing, serving the poorest of the poor at their doorsteps.

One day, he met a destitute woman named Aum Demola in a remote village in Bhutan. "Her most prized asset was her leftover meal from the previous night that she kept under lock in a wooden box in her bamboo hut," says Nima. "She had the key around her neck."

Tears well in Nima's eyes as he recalls. "This experience taught me the real meaning of you don't know where your next meal is coming from. It shook my conscience. It gave me a calling." He spent the next three years walking to more than 300 remote villages in Bhutan, helping thousands like her.

Nima believes that you can change the world better when you truly lead with empathy. "Happiness is being human first," Nima smiles.

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